It's a King (1932) - A Silly, Dusty Comedy for Lazy Sundays

Look, if you are looking for a masterpiece, It's a King is absolutely not it. But if you have a soft spot for dusty, 1930s British comedies where everyone talks like they have a marble in their mouth, this might just cure your Sunday boredom. 🛋️

Sydney Howard plays a regular guy who gets mistaken for a foreign king, which is basically the plot of every third movie made back then. It's silly, it's cheap, and the set looks like it might fall over if someone closes a door too hard.

I actually found myself laughing at how bad the sound is in the beginning. It literally sounds like they recorded the actors inside a giant tin can.

Sydney Howard has this incredibly round face and he just stares at the camera sometimes when a joke lands flat. It is like he's begging the audience to help him out of this script.

There is this one scene with a fake beard that goes on for what feels like ten minutes. Why did they think beard humor was so funny in 1932?

It reminds me a bit of the slow pacing in Born Rich, where you just keep waiting for the actual plot to kick in.

And the music! It just blares out of nowhere to tell you 'Hey, this is the funny part!' even when nothing funny is happening.

Cinematic perspective: Exploring the visual vocabulary of It's a King (1933) through its definitive frames.

I kept watching though, mostly because Arthur Goullet is so delightfully weird as the henchman. His mustache looks like it was glued on sideways during his first scene.

I am almost positive it shifts slightly to the left after he sneezes in the hallway scene. Nobody seemed to care enough to do a second take.

The romance side of things is totally blank. Joan Maude is there to look pretty and concerned, but she has about as much chemistry with the lead as a wet piece of cardboard. 📦

During the palace scenes, you can see about four people standing in the background trying to look like an entire crowd. It has that oddly empty feeling, like half the extras got lost on the way to the studio.

Honestly, it feels like a high school play with a slightly bigger budget. But there is a charm to how honest it is about being a bit rubbish.

At least it doesn't take itself seriously like some other dusty dramas from the same era, such as Gigolete.

If you want something silly to put on in the background while you fold laundry, this is your movie. Just don't expect to remember any of it by tomorrow morning.